Evaluation 7 — Semester 2: Esoteric Practices for Spiritual Mastery

In Root to Rise, Anna Rhodes develops a complete ritual of integration and wholeness, bringing elemental consciousness, planetary forces, Akasha, the Philosopher’s Stone, and communion with the Holy Guardian Angel into a single ceremony.

The work moves from seeing the Holy Guardian Angel as an external Other toward recognizing the Angel as a presence within the undivided center of one’s being.

Anna Rhodes

The School of Visionary Hermeticism

Semester 2- Esoteric Practices for Spiritual Mastery

Evaluation 7

7/26/26

Root to Rise

A Rite of Integration and Wholeness

Journal Entry

Perhaps the greatest test was never whether I could recognize my HGA when it appeared before me.

Perhaps it was whether I would one day trust the same Presence when it arose quietly from within.

Central Philosophy

The Great Work is not the manufacture of a new self, but the gradual removal of all that obscures the wholeness already present. Rooted in the undivided center, I rise into the fullest expression of truth, beauty, wisdom, creativity, love, and service.

Preparation

• a white candle
• a stone for the mineral kingdom
• a plant for the vegetal kingdom
• your journal

Intention

Light the candle and sit until I feel present in my body.

I enter this temple to participate consciously in my Great Work.
May everything that follows lead toward greater integration, equilibrium, and wholeness.                                I establish this rite in harmony with the One Living Source.

The Circle of Intention

Bring awareness to the solar plexus. Allow intention to gather there as a living vibration rather than merely a visual image. With each breath, let it expand through my body, the room, and the surrounding space.

From the living center, intention radiates.
I establish this temple through coherence, presence, and Will.
Rooted within, I become the circle.
Nothing essential is excluded.
Nothing true is divided.

(Pause)

Rooted in the One Living Source, I enter the living circle whose circumference is nowhere and whose center is everywhere.

May this ritual unfold from that living center, through integration, into wholeness.

The Elements as Consciousness; Circle Creation                                                                        

Air – Mind

Experience lightness, movement, clarity, imagination, and discernment.

Air lives in my Mind:
the power to perceive, understand, imagine, and name.

As this feather moves upon the breath (hold macaw feather and exhale giving breath),
My thoughts serve truth rather than fragmentation.

Fire – Will

Experience heat, expansion, purpose, and directed force.

Fire lives in my Will:
the courage to choose, act, transform, and persevere.

As this flame rises toward the light (light a candle),
My Will arises from wholeness rather than division.

Water – Soul

Experience receptivity, depth, feeling, connection, and movement.

Water lives in my Soul:
the capacity to receive, love, reconcile, and commune.

As this fragrant water flows (pour rose water into cup),
My feelings move without losing their center.

Earth – Body

Experience weight, stability, form, patience, and embodiment.

Earth lives in my Body:
the vessel through which the Work becomes real.
My life gives form to what my spirit knows.

Hold stone.

Stone, you have taught me stillness, endurance, memory, and form.
Within me is that which remains steady through every changing identity.

Hold the olive tree.

Living green, you have taught me growth, trust, season, and renewal.
All my branches arise from one root.
I do not rise by abandoning the depths.
I rise because I am rooted.

Breathe while imagining the stillness of stone and the growth of the plant circulating together within me.

Stillness and growth are not opposites.
The root descends as the life rises.
I receive both as teachers of my Great Work.

The Planetary Chord

Awaken each planetary quality within my whole subtle being rather than forcing a precise anatomical placement. (Look at images of each planet with it’s line and “copy and paste” into bodies.)

Luna, awaken as imagination and sacred receptivity.
Mercury, awaken as thought, language, and understanding.
Venus, awaken as love, harmony, beauty, and communion.
Sol, awaken as spirit, radiance, and central identity.
Mars, awaken as courage and decisive strength.
Jupiter, awaken as wisdom, generosity, and meaningful expansion.
Saturn, awaken as discipline, endurance, boundary, and time.

Pause after each until it feels present. Then say:

You are not competing powers within me.
You are notes within one sacred chord.
From one root, many branches.
From one center, many expressions.
Through harmony, I rise.

The Philosopher’s Stone

Gaze into the sphere around me. Gather into it:

• my strengths and fears
• my fulfilled and unfinished identities
• my leadership and vulnerability
• my knowledge and uncertainty
• my love, creativity, wisdom, grief, courage, and service
• every tradition and teacher that has helped shape me

Do not reject anything merely because it appears imperfect.

I pour into this vessel all that I have been,
all that I am,
and all that I will be.
Nothing true is discarded.
Nothing wounded is banished.
Everything is offered to the Work of integration.

Let the sphere become clear.

The Philosopher’s Stone is not an object I manufacture.
It is the transparent wholeness revealed
when what is false no longer obscures what is true.
The Stone is the power in all that I am –
purified, reconciled, and made available to life.

Then enter silence and become aware of Akasha behind and within all four elements, planets, and the Philosopher’s Stone. (I meant to do this after the elements and skipped over it- my guidance was to include it here in the ritual.)

Akasha, clear source behind all forms,
reveal the unity from which the elements arise.
Fire, Water, Air, and Earth become one equilibrium within me.

(Added lines due to inserting akasha here):

Akasha, reveal the unity of the planetary chord. Akasha, maintain the clarity of the Philosopher’s Stone.

I behold myself not as separate pieces,
but as a living expression of the One Living Source.

Emergence of the HGA

Approach through the heart, pineal, and crown. Let the HGA emerge from the clarity of the sphere without forcing a form.

Beloved and eternal counterpart,
hidden within every gate I crossed,
silent beneath every voice,
present through shadow and flame –
I recognize you.

Pause.

Once I sought you as One beyond me.

Now I discover your guidance in the deepest center of my own being.

Whether encountered as Presence, Silence, Light, or Love,
I no longer measure our communion by appearance.

I recognize the center in which our Wills are one.

The Vow

I vow to live from wholeness
and to return whenever I become divided.

I vow not to banish the parts of myself
that ask for understanding, healing, and integration.

I vow to distinguish authenticity from impulse,
love from self-abandonment,
and Will from force.

I vow to listen inwardly, act truthfully,
love deliberately, and serve without losing myself.

I vow to root before I rise,
so that everything I offer the world
may grow from an honest and undivided center.

Imagine the HGA receiving the vow. Then step forward – or draw the sphere toward your heart – and allow the apparent distance to dissolve.

Whether once experienced as Other or now known from within,
the Work has always been one of recognition.

I no longer cling to appearance.
I return to the living center,
where guidance and love arise together.

The Law of My Great Work

The Law of my Great Work is this:
Rooted in the wholeness of the One Living Source, I rise into authentic expression.
From the undivided center, truth, love, wisdom, creativity, and right action arise in harmony.

My Mission on Earth

I do not yet know every form my mission will take.
I know its ground.

My mission is to live from wholeness –
to meet myself, others, the sacred, and the living world
from an undivided center.

I will allow truth, beauty, wisdom, creativity, love, and service
to take the forms naturally required of me.

My mission is to become transparent enough
that what is mine to do can arise clearly.

Place hands over my heart and breathe in slowly, receiving from the root. Breathe out deliberately, extending my life into the world.

Rooted within.
Rising in truth.
Living as one.

Magical Word or Logos

Primary phrase: ROOT TO RISE

• Root: center, wholeness, grounding, origin.
• To: process, participation, becoming.
• Rise: expression, service, creativity, embodiment.

Single Word: WHOLENESS

Full Logos:

From the root of wholeness, I rise into the authentic expression of the One Living Source.

Communion with HGA

Divine Beloved,

You have walked with me in ways both seen and unseen.
I entrust to you what belongs to your wisdom.

I now accept what belongs to my part.

My part is to remember.
My part is to choose.
My part is to practice.
My part is to integrate.
My part is to return, again and again, to the living center.

May every breath become participation in the Great Work.

I am Yours.

You are Mine.

We are One.

(Stillness…)

Closing

The circle does not vanish;
it becomes my manner of living.

The elements do not depart;
they return to equilibrium within me.

The planets do not fall silent;
they continue as one living chord.

The Angel does not leave;
I remember the center.

Rooted in the One Living Source,
I choose the path of continual integration.
I return to wholeness.
I rise in truth.
May every step become part of the Great Work.

And so it is.

Express gratitude.

Extinguish candles and close circle.

Perform Tibetan Rites to assimilate energies.

Ground to earth.

Ritual experiences and commentary

I performed this ritual in both my physical and astral temples. I created a magical circle by placing the elements in their traditional directions, and realized that I may have confused the elemental correspondences, as placing water immediately after fire felt discordant. I also unintentionally skipped over akasha directly after the elements; my inner guidance prompted me to place akasha directly after the Philosopher’s Stone and I added a few extra lines to my ritual script.

For me, the script serves not merely as a series of declarative affirmations, but as a meaningful expression of the ritual as a whole.

The Holy Guardian Angel was experienced much as in lectures 11 and 13; a silent presence, a jewel within that undivided center. Years ago, I sought the Holy Guardian Angel as Other. Today, I experience the Angel as the quiet presence of the living center within. That shift—from seeking to remembering—has become the most meaningful fruit of this work. I leave this course with a deeper trust in direct experience, discernment, and the quiet wisdom that arises from the One Living Source.